LOVE AND LIFE
Ruth lay awake long after she had retired to rest. The fear which had been expressed by Ralph increased her own a thousandfold. If William should die, not only would her brother lose his best friend—there was a more terrible thought than that, a thought which need not be expressed in words, for nobody understood.
Somebody has said that a woman never loves until her love is asked for; that though all the elements are there, they remain dormant till a simple question fires the train. But love—especially the love of a woman—is too subtle, too elusive a thing to be covered by any sweeping generalisation.
William had never spoken his love to Ruth, never even looked it, yet the fire had got alight in Ruth's heart somehow. When it began she did not know. For long she had no suspicion what it meant. Later on she tried to trample it out; she felt ashamed and humiliated. The bare thought of loving a man who had never spoken of love to her covered her with confusion.
Sometimes she tried to persuade herself that it was not love she felt for William Menire, but only gratitude mingled with admiration. He had been the best friend she and her brother had ever known. All their present prosperity they owed to him, and everything he had done for them was without ostentation. He was not a showy man, and only those who knew him intimately guessed how great he was, how fine his spirit, how exalted his ideals.
She had never thought much about love until Sam Tremail proposed to her; but when once the subject stared her in the face she was bound to look at it. And while she was looking and trying to find what answer her heart gave, William came with the announcement that the farm was theirs, and theirs through his help and instrumentality. From that moment she knew that it was not Sam Tremail she loved. Of course, she had known all along that Sam was not the equal of his cousin in any sense of the word. But Sam was young and handsome and well-to-do, while William was journeying toward middle life, and had many of the ways of a confirmed bachelor.
It came to her as in a flash that all true love must be built on reverence. Youth and good looks might inspire a romantic attachment, a fleeting emotion, a passing fancy, but the divine passion of love grew out of something deeper. It was not a dewdrop sparkling on a leaf. It was a fountain springing out of the heart of the hills.
With knowledge came pain and confusion. She had not the courage to look William in the eyes. She was in constant dread lest she should reveal her secret. She would not for the world that he should know. If he should ever guess she would die of shame.
From that day onward she had a harder battle to fight than anyone knew—perhaps the hardest of all battles that a woman is called upon to wage. William came and went constantly; helped them when they removed to Hillside, and was never failing in friendly suggestions. Ralph was so full of the mine that such small details as wallpapers and carpets and curtains never occurred to him, and when they were mentioned he told Ruth to make her own choice. It was William who came to the rescue in those days, and saved her an infinity of trouble and anxiety.
Ruth thought of all this as she lay awake, listening to the faint and fitful rattle of the stamps beyond the hill. Was this brave, unselfish life to be suddenly quenched—this meek but heroic soul to be taken away from earth?
She was pale and hollow-eyed when she came downstairs next morning, but Ralph was too absorbed to notice it. He too had been kept awake thinking about William, and directly breakfast was over he hurried away to Veryan to make inquiries.
Ruth waited till noon for news—waited with more impatience than she had ever felt before. She had no need to ask Ralph if William was better. She knew by the look in his eyes that he was not. After that, the hours and days moved with leaden feet. Ralph went to Veryan twice every day, and sometimes three times. Ruth grew more and more silent. Her task became more painfully difficult. Other people could talk about William, could praise his qualities, could recount the story of his simple and heroic life, but she, by her very love for him, was doomed to silence.
She envied the nurse who could sit by his bedside and minister to his needs. She felt that it was her place. No one cared for him as she did. It seemed a cruel thing that her very love should keep her from his side, and shut her up in silence.
Ralph came in hurriedly one evening, and sat down to table; but after eating a few mouthfuls, he laid down his knife and fork, and pushed his plate from him.
"I suppose you know William is dying?" he said, without raising his eyes.
She looked at him with a startled expression, but did not speak. She made an effort, but the words froze on her tongue.
"One should not doubt the Eternal wisdom," he went on huskily, "but it seems a huge mistake. There are a hundred men who could be better spared."
"God knows best," Ruth tried to say, but she was never sure that the words escaped her lips.
"He seems quite resigned to his fate," Ralph continued, after a pause. "The doctor told him this morning that if he had any worldly affairs to settle he should put them in order without delay. He appears to be waiting now for the end."
"He is not afraid?" Ruth questioned, bringing out the words with a great effort.
"Not a bit. He reminds me of father more than any man I have ever known. His confidence is that of a little child. By-the-bye, he would like to see you before he goes."
"See me, Ralph?"
"He expressed himself very doubtfully and timidly, and asked me if I thought you would mind coming to say good-bye."
"There could be no harm in it, Ralph?"
"Not a bit. He has been like an elder brother to us both."
"Yes—yes." And she rose from the table at once, and went upstairs to get her hat and jacket.
"What, ready so soon?" he questioned, when she appeared again.
"I may be too late as it is," she answered, in a voice that she scarcely recognised as her own.
"I will go with you," he said, "for it will be dark when you return."
For awhile they walked rapidly and in silence, but when the village came in sight they slackened their pace a little.
"It is hard to give up hope," Ralph said, as if speaking to himself. "He was so healthy and so strong, and he has lived a life so temperate and so clean that he ought to pull through anything."
"Does the doctor say there is no hope?"
"He has none himself."
William was listening with every sense alert. He knew by some subtle instinct, some spiritual telepathy, that Ruth was near. He caught her whisper in the hall, he knew her footstep when she came quickly up the stairs, and the beating of his heart seemed to get beyond all bounds.
He was too weak to raise himself in bed, but his eyes were strained toward the door.
"You will leave me when she comes," he said to the nurse as soon as he heard Ruth's voice in the hall, and directly the door was pushed open the nurse disappeared.
Ruth walked straight up to the bedside without faltering. William feebly raised his wasted hand, and she took it in both hers. She was very composed. She wondered at herself, and was barely conscious of the effort she was making.
He was the first to break the silence, and he spoke with a great effort, and with many pauses.
"Will you not sit there, where I can see you?" he said, indicating a chair close to the bedside. "It is very good of you to come. I thought you would, for you have always been kind to me."
The tears came very near her eyes, but she resolutely raised her hand to hide them from William.
"You and your brother have been my dearest friends," he went on. "Ralph is a noble fellow, and I do not wonder that you are proud of him. It has been a great joy to me to know him—to know you both."
"That feeling has been mutual," Ruth struggled to say; but William scarcely waited to hear her out. Perhaps he felt that what he had to say must be said quickly.
"I thought I would like to tell you how much I have valued your friendship—there can be no harm in that, can there?"
"Why, no," she interposed.
"But that is not all," he went on. "I want to say something more, and there surely can be no harm in saying it now. I am nearing the end, the doctor says."
"Say anything you like," she interrupted, in a great sob of emotion.
"You cannot be angry with me now," he continued. "You might have been had I told you sooner. I know I have been very presumptuous, very daring, but I could not help it. You stole my heart unconsciously. I loved you in those dark days when you lived in the little cottage at St. Goram. I wanted to help you then. And oh, Ruth, I have loved you ever since—not with the blind, unreasoning passion of youth, but with the deep, abiding reverence of mature years. My love for you is the sweetest, purest, strongest thing I have ever cherished; and now that I am going hence the impulse became so strong that I could not resist telling you."
She turned to him suddenly, her eyes swimming in tears.
"Oh, William——" Then her voice faltered.
"You are not angry with me, Ruth?" he questioned, almost in a whisper.
"Angry with you? Oh, William——But why did you not tell me before?"
"I was afraid to tell you, Ruth—afraid to put an end to our friendship."
She knelt down on the floor by his bedside and laid her face on his hand, and he felt her hot tears falling like rain.
For awhile neither of them spoke again; then she raised her head suddenly, and with a pitiful smile on her face she said—
"You must not die, William!"
"Not die?" he questioned.
"No, no! For my sake you must get better," and she looked eagerly and earnestly into his eyes, as though she would compel assent to her words.
"Why for your sake?" he asked slowly and musingly.
"Why? Oh, William, do you not understand? Can you not see——"
"Surely—surely," he said, a great light breaking over his face, "you cannot mean that—that——"
"But I do mean it," she interrupted. "How could I mean anything else?"
He half rose in bed, as if inspired with new strength, then lay back again with a weary and long-drawn sigh. She rose quickly to her feet, and bent over him with a little cry. A pallor so deathly stole over his face that she thought he was dying.
After a few moments he rallied again, and smiled reassuringly. Then the nurse came back into the room.
"You will come again?" he whispered, holding out his hand.
She answered him with a smile, and then hurried down the stairs.
She gave no hint to Ralph of what had passed between them, and during the journey home through the darkness very little was said; but she walked with a more buoyant step than during the outward journey, and in her eye there was a brighter light, though Ralph did not see it.
She scarcely slept at all that night. She spent most of the time on her knees in prayer. Before Ralph got down to breakfast she had been to Veryan and back again. She did not allude, however, to this second journey. William was still alive, and in much the same condition.
For nearly two days he dwelt in the valley of the shadow, and no one could tell whether the angel of life or of death would prevail. The doctor looked in every few hours, and did all that human skill could do. William, though too spent to talk, and almost too weak to open his eyes, was acutely conscious of what was taking place.
To the onlookers it seemed as if he was passing into a condition of coma, but it was not so. He was fighting for life with all the will power he possessed. He had something to live for now. A new hope was in his heart, a new influence was breathing upon him. So he fought back the destroying angel inch by inch, and in the end prevailed.
There came a day when Ruth again sat by his bedside, holding his hand.
"I am getting better, sweetheart," he said, in a whisper.
"Yes, William."
"Your love and prayers have pulled me through."
"I could not let you go," she said.
"God has been very merciful," he answered reverently. "Next to His love the most wonderful thing is yours."
"Why should it be wonderful?" she asked, with a smile.
"You are so beautiful," he answered, "and I am so unworthy, and so——"
But she laid her hand upon his mouth and smothered the end of the sentence.
When once he had turned the corner he got better rapidly, but long before he was able to leave the house all St. Goram knew that Ruth Penlogan had promised to be his wife.
Ralph saw very little of his sister in those days, she spent so much of her time in going and coming between Hillside and Veryan. Fortunately the affairs of the mine kept his hands occupied and his thoughts busy, otherwise he would have felt himself neglected and alone.
It was not without a pang he saw the happiness of William and his sister. Not that he envied them; on the contrary, he rejoiced in their newly found joy; and yet their happiness did accentuate his own heartache and sense of loss.
A year had passed since that memorable day in St. James's Park when he told Dorothy Hamblyn that he loved her. He often smiled at his temerity, and wondered what spirit of daring or of madness possessed him.
He had tried hard since, as he had tried before, to forget her, but without success. For good or ill she held his heart in bondage. What had become of her he did not know. Hamblyn Manor was in possession of the gardener and his wife, and one other servant. There were rumours that some "up-the-country" people had taken it furnished for a year, but as far as he knew no one as yet had appeared on the scene. Sir John, it was said, was living quietly at Boulogne, but what had become of Dorothy and her brother no one seemed to know.
One afternoon he left Dingley Bottom earlier than usual, and wandered up the long slant in the direction of Treliskey Plantation. His intention was to cross the common to St. Goram, but on reaching the stile he stood still, arrested by the force of memory and association.
As he looked back into the valley he could not help contrasting the present with the past. How far away that never-to-be-forgotten afternoon seemed when he first came face to face with Dorothy Hamblyn! How much had happened since! Then he was a poor, struggling, discontented, ambitious youth, without prospects, without influence, and almost without hope.
Now he was rich—for riches are always relative—and a man. He had prospects also, and influence. Perhaps he had more influence than any other man in the parish. And yet he was not sure that he was not just as discontented as ever. He was gaining the world rapidly, but he was still unsatisfied. His heart was hungering for something he had not got.
He might get more money, more power, more authority, more influence. What then? The care of the world increased rather than diminished. It was eternally true, "A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things he possesseth."
His reflections were disturbed at length by the clicking of the gate leading into the plantation. He turned his head suddenly, and found himself face to face with Dorothy Hamblyn.